Plenty of advice

Wow, one simple post on Trail magazine's forum (on this thread) has already revealed so much advice from walkers who have either done or are training for their Mountain Leader (ML), like me.

The main thrust of their advice for aspirant MLs is ask as many questions as you can and don't be afraid to make mistakes.

After the training, their advice is to get as much experience as possible, not just the 20 Quality Mountain Days as required.

If you're thinking about doing your ML training, take Trail's quiz to see if you're ready.

Watch out hills...

...here I come!

I'm super excited about doing my mountain leader training with Stuart Johnston Mountaineering next week. It's up in Scotland for a whole week of navigation, rope work, emergency procedures, weather, expedition skills, group management and environmental awareness training. Check out the course here.

The skill that scares me most is navigating in featureless terrain, or in mist.

Other scary aspects are being wet, cold, tired and hungry and still in charge of where to go.

The skill I'm most looking forward to is learning how to lead people on the hill.

I'm also really keen to meet the 5 other people on my course who will be on my wavelength.

Is anyone else thinking about doing their ML, are you working towards your assessment of have you passed?

I'll be writing a blog on this soon, so any advice, questions or feedback from you guys would be fantastic.

I'll be interviewing Stuart and the other candidates, so if you post your questions here I'll do my best to get them answered.

Claire